Frogfish, Anilao Philippines

Frogfish are one of my favorite subjects to take photos of.  They are a type of angler fish.  They can look like stone, coral, or sponges.  Sometimes having algae on them or hydrozoa.  Like other angler fish they have a modified dorsal fin spine on their head that acts as a fishing lure to attract food.  They blend in so well into the environment, the only thing the prey sees is the lure.  Frogfish can catch something in their mouth within 6 milliseconds.  Other than opening their mouth to catch prey, they move pretty slow.  A lot of times, they are motionless.   When taking photos of them, sometimes they will yawn, protruding out their very large mouths.  This is a sign they have had enough of you being around.  During mating, males are best to leave the females alone after conception.  Females have been known to eat males after fertilization if they don’t let them be.  Overall, they enjoy posing for the camera and blend in very well into the environment so you have to look carefully for them.  There is a lot that is not known about Frogfish.  How do they know they have to change colors and when?  Nevertheless, I appreciate them and think their techniques for survival and adaptation are amazing.  This frogfish was showing great color and was completely motionless.  I approached him trying to get the camera right up to his body so the strobes could give off some unique lighting effects.  I slightly turned the strobes out so only part of light would hit the subject.  This caused the image to have a combination of lighter and darker images.  I think it helped create depth to the colors of this frogfish.